However, he remembered that he had been slighter, and had a soft hand, and that he often brought flowers.

Very often--for his father would constantly say: "What, another bouquet! But this is madness, my dear fellow; you will ruin yourself in roses." And Marechal would say: "No matter; I like it." And suddenly his mother's voice and accent, his mother's as she smiled and said: "Thank you, my kind friend," flashed on his brain, so clearly that he could have believed he heard her.

She must have spoken those words very often that they should remain thus graven on her son's memory.
So Marechal brought flowers; he, the gentleman, the rich man, the customer, to the humble shop-keeper, the jeweller's wife.

Had he loved her?
Why should he have made friends with these tradespeople if he had not been in love with the wife?
He was a man of education and fairly refined tastes.

How many a time had he discussed poets and poetry with Pierre.